Orange County sued for lack of redistricting

Claims disparity in districts hurts rights of voters

GOSHEN — Orange County was sued on Monday for failing to redraw its 21 legislative districts for this year's elections — reviving a heated issue county lawmakers dropped last month after deadlocking on a proposed political map and then running out of time.

GOSHEN — Orange County was sued on Monday for failing to redraw its 21 legislative districts for this year's elections — reviving a heated issue county lawmakers dropped last month after deadlocking on a proposed political map and then running out of time.

Civil-rights attorney Michael Sussman filed the case in federal court in White Plains on behalf of a Highland Falls resident.

He argues that holding elections this year with outdated legislative lines would violate the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause, and asks the court to appoint a special master to create new districts.

"I consider this a very important suit, because we can't have a Legislature that's elected on unconstitutional lines," Sussman said at a news conference announcing the lawsuit at his law offices in Goshen.

The case, brought about a month before candidates are set to begin petitioning to run for county Legislature seats, renews the possibility that the lines may shift before then.

The county's rushed, rocky redistricting began in late February with the release of a proposed legislative map drawn privately by two Republican lawmakers, with no outside input and little time for debate.

Legislators defeated a revised version of that plan in a 10-10 vote on April 5 and later declined to take up a third version because of time constraints.

Without court intervention, elections would proceed this year with legislative lines that were adopted in 2005 based on 2000 census figures. Those lines are so outdated that the populations of individual districts — which are supposed to be roughly equal in size — vary by as much as 30 percent from the targeted average of 17,753.

Sussman's lawsuit contends that the wide disparity in district sizes violates the "one person, one vote" principle stemming from the Fourteenth Amendment, because it weakens the relative voting power of voters in more populous districts.

The plaintiff, Ann Molina, lives in Legislative District 14, which has 21,629 residents — 20 percent above the average. The lawsuit alleges 80,000 county residents in all are in districts with diluted voting power.

A hearing on the lawsuit has been scheduled for Friday before District Court Judge Edgardo Ramos.

Sussman is asking Ramos to have a special master draw a legislative map with technical assistance from the county Planning Department by June 3 and hold a public hearing on the proposal by June 10.

That suggested timetable would require the judge to shorten or move forward the period for candidate petitioning, which is set to begin on June 4.

A special master assigned to draw legislative lines would have as many as five proposed maps to consider, including three versions of the Republican-initiated plan and two alternatives created by the Center for Research, Regional Education and Outreach in at SUNY New Paltz and by Mark Levy, a Salisbury Mills resident.